The present exemplary embodiment relates generally to processing an electronic document file for printing on a select printer. It finds particular application when the electronic document file includes print parameter information associated with a former printer that are at least not fully compatible with a new printer. However, it is to be appreciated that the exemplary embodiments described herein are also amenable to printing any electronic document file that includes print parameter information associated with a different printer than the printer selected for printing.
Traditionally, vendors have a hard time entering into environments where competitors have an established presence. Customers tend to resist changing what already works for them for a variety of reasons. When a customer does change to a different vendor's devices, the new vendor works with the customer in order to provide a smooth transition.
One issue that arises during this transition period is that the customer may find that their documents, which used to print correctly on previous vendor's devices, do not print correctly on the new vendor's devices. The root causes tend to be differences in media sizes, media types, and input tray selection, or differences between vendor-specific features.
Device vendors tend to release printer drivers that allow consistency amongst their own devices and do little to no work to ensure any compatibility between devices from other vendors. In fact, it's often advantageous to promote maximum incompatibility between devices from other vendors in order to make customers reluctant to switch vendors.
The customers do not care what the root causes are, their only concern is that when they printed on the previous vendor's devices, what used to print correctly now does not, forcing them to re-print documents and waste valuable resources. One way to resolve this issue is to limit replacement of current vendor devices to devices from other vendors that are more compatible. With this approach, the customer has to trade off new functionality with compatibility. Another way to resolve the issue is to revise all the customer documents to be compatible with the new vendor's devices. The customer is likely to lose revenue after deciding to switch to another vendor's device even if some of the incompatibility issues are resolved because of the amount of work required in modifying documents. Under these circumstances, the customer may remain with the current vendor and the potential new vendor loses revenue from losing the potential new customer.